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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/23287816">You burn first.</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/andchimeras/pseuds/andchimeras'>andchimeras</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Additional Warnings In Author's Note, Canonical Child Abuse, Gen, Natasha wins, Red Room (Marvel), Reverse Chronology, Winter Soldier Bucky Barnes, general red room warnings, new fandom? new fandom, the lacroix of canon compliance</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-03-24</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-03-24</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-01 10:47:21</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Mature</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Graphic Depictions Of Violence</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>983</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/23287816</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/andchimeras/pseuds/andchimeras</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>"She's not afraid of the room; there have been so many rooms. It doesn't matter what door opens, there’s just a room on the other side. And then the door closes."</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>2</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>9</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>You burn first.</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Spoilery content notes at the end.</p><p>Beta by dangercupcake. annaaaaaaaaa you are so nice to me why.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span><b>i.</b></span>
</p><p>
  <span>Its arm whirs and then clicks again.</span>
</p><p><br/>
<br/>
</p><p>
  <span><b>ii.</b></span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Open,” she whispers through the raw swelling in her throat. “The door,” she whispers through the blood in her mouth.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The door doesn’t open.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Open the door,” she says with her bitten tongue and her bitten cheeks and her bitten lips.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Open the door,” she repeats.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Firmly: “Open the door.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Angry: “Open the door!”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Open the door,” she says, “please?” They never care about her manners in this room. But maybe.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The door doesn’t open. It’s not--going? To open?</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She does, she thinks, need to learn to be in the room with a body. A body with its blood all over her, with her handprints in its blood on either side of it. On its face. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“<i>Open the door</i>,” she begs. She doesn’t want to learn. She doesn’t want to. She’s been in the room with it so many times, for so long, while it was living or--or whatever it does while it’s ripping her into smaller and smaller pieces.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She feels the shaking start at her jaw, the back of her head, and then it spreads everywhere, straight down to the tacky blood on the soles of her feet. Over every wound and bruise and scar into the leaden brokenness inside of her.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“<i>Open the door</i>!” she screams.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>There’s a click and her breath stops, her body lightens for flight, her eyes flick to the door, because <i>maybe</i>.</span>
</p><p><br/>
<br/>
</p><p>
  <span><b>iii</b>.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Standing over the body, heaving chest, hands bloody. Front bloody. Thighs bloody. All this blood dripping into the smears on the floor between them. The blunt handle of the blade in its neck; the long, wet wounds from its neck to its waist.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Tacky blood between her fingers, strands of hair and pieces of string stuck to her palms. The sting on her forearms where the blade was turned the wrong way as she stabbed at--it; the body. She can feel the blood still coming from the cuts on her face. A wet lock of hair sticks to her cheek, over her eye where she can see it while she’s staring at the body.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The door doesn’t open.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She did it, but the door doesn’t open.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She doesn’t want to take her eyes off the body. It’s so silent and can hide so well just past the corners of her eyes; she doesn’t want to look away, but the door doesn’t open.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Open the door, she thinks at the bowie knife.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Open the door, she thinks at the body.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Open the door, she thinks at the cameras in the corners.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Open the door, she thinks at the man behind the door.</span>
</p><p>
  <span><i>Open the door</i>.</span>
</p><p><br/>
<br/>
</p><p>
  <span><b>iv.</b></span>
</p><p>
  <span>She screams in its face and claws at its neck, yanks at the collar of its heavy shirt as its metal fingers, slick with her sweat and blood, start to close around her throat. She hears a stitch pop and it’s almost background noise, except that it’s not her clothing. She tightens her grip and tears with both her hands and <i>there</i>, <i>there</i>. The grip of the knife meets her palm solid and plastic. She can hear her own choked growl of <i>maybe</i> the sweat, snot, tears on her face. She braces her bare feet on its thighs, her legs aching from kicking at something with no give. The edge of the knife slices into its skin as she pulls the blade.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Her hair and its hair stuck to their foreheads. Both of their faces bitten at the nose and jaw; claw marks on its forehead. Its eyes clenched at the corners, fixed on her face. Its ragged breath and gritted teeth grunts become sharp, vicious hissing and a shocked howl. Soon, blood.</span>
</p><p><br/>
<br/>
</p><p>
  <span><b>iv.</b></span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You’re not very observant, are you,” Rouben says.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I’ve been looking!” Natasha says. “I’ve looked everywhere!”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Evidently not.” They reach the end of the hallway and he opens the door. “You will have to try again.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She’s not afraid of the room; there have been so many rooms. It doesn’t matter what door opens, there’s just a room on the other side. And then the door closes.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“What am I supposed to do,” she says--not a question anymore; she knows the two-word answer, but she has to ask, because <i>maybe</i>.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Stop him.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Natasha is pushed into the room and the door is closed. She doesn’t turn and try the handle. The door doesn’t open.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Her eyes dart to every seam of the walls, ceiling, floor while she flips the wooden furniture: two ladder-backed chairs, the small table between them, the chest of drawers in the corner. She runs her fingers over the seams of the mattress while she kicks the legs off the chairs and table. She rips into the mattress with her bare hands; not even a spring. Then the drawers of the chest; pieces of pine torn apart at their clean joins. The solid door to the small closet. The nails and screws clatter to the floor, having disappointed her too many times.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>No rod in the closet. No shelf to tear down. Outside of the window is only a brick wall. There is no curtain rod. No pull cords for blinds or lights; if she could just get close enough to its neck. She becomes aware of hyperventilating and forces herself to deliberate breath, imagining taking her ribs in her hands and pumping them in and out. Not helpful, but she’d <i>hoped</i>, for some reason. This time.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Nowhere else to hide a blade or a packet of powder or even a length of string.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She is in the centre of the room, because hiding doesn’t matter. Standing against a wall or in a corner doesn’t matter; it makes it worse.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>There’s a click, and her eyes don’t even go to the door anymore. A metallic whirring noise, and another click, and then it lets her hear it breathing.</span>
</p><p> </p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>1. The Winter Soldier is basically used as a terrible torture training dummy for Natasha; she is to "stop him" by whatever means necessary. There are not a lot of means; things get heated. This has happened multiple times, but only one instance is described in the story.</p><p>2. The "graphic violence" is mostly psychological, but there's also a murder with lots of blood. Good news: Natasha wins! Sort of!</p><p>3. I have chosen to use the pronoun "it" to refer to the Winter Soldier in this story. Noting it so people know it's on purpose.</p><p>4. Title from "You Burn First" by Alexisonfire.</p></blockquote></div></div>
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